


We'll Meet Again

by Fire_Sign



Series: She is the heroine of her own damn story [1]
Category: Agent Carter (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: 95-percent salt by volume, Daniel deserved better, F/M, Peggy deserved better, Steve deserved better, endgame spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-26
Updated: 2019-04-26
Packaged: 2020-02-04 17:44:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18609412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fire_Sign/pseuds/Fire_Sign
Summary: ENDGAME SPOILERS================It’s April 1955 and Peggy is having a rare day alone at home--she’d actually left her work at the office for the weekend, and Daniel has taken Michael to pick Angie up from the airport (a lie she allows him to tell, because her son is utterly determined to keep the cake they areactuallypicking up a secret)--when there is a knock at the door. She’s not sure what she’s expecting on the other side, but it sure as hell isn’t Steve Rogers.An attempt to fix the completely absurd ending of Endgame while keeping continuity and characterisation intact. I mean, it's not like I could do WORSE.





	We'll Meet Again

**Author's Note:**

> So, I am almost entirely a lurker in this fandom, but turns out that Avengers: Endgame was some Grade A bullshit in terms of continuity and characterisation, and I had to spite write a fixit so I could move on and get back to making my OTHER favourite Attractive Investigators bang. As a result, this was written in an hour and should be read accordingly. 😂 Are the voices right? Probably not, it's been ages since I watched Agent Carter properly; two years of "I really need to write that AC/Miss Fisher crossover fic, just as soon as I have time to rewatch and research things properly", and one damned movie has me writing my first AC fic instead. The file name on this was "PeggyCarterIsHeroineOfHerOwnDamnStory", to give you some idea of how pissed I was. (None of this is particularly interesting unless you know me from elsewhere, but I have a habit of rambling to myself.)
> 
> Title is obviously from the Vera Lynn song that everyone knows and uses for WW2 stories, but all my alternatives are 100% snark.

It’s April 1955 and Peggy is having a rare day alone at home--she’d actually left her work at the office for the weekend, and Daniel has taken Michael to pick Angie up from the airport (a lie she allows him to tell, because her son is utterly determined to keep the cake they are _actually_ picking up a secret)--when there is a knock at the door. She’s not sure what she’s expecting on the other side, but it sure as hell isn’t Steve Rogers.

She grabs a heavy vase from the table beside the door, but he raises his hands and smiles.

“It’s me, Peggy, it’s Steve.”

“Prove it.”

She sees a hundred alternatives flit across his face; some part of her already knows.

“Did you go to the Stork Club that Saturday?”

The vase drops from her hands, the ceramic shattering at her feet, but even in her shock she is doubtful. Has learnt to be doubtful. Careful. 

“9 o’clock on the dot.” 

“Eight,” he corrects, and it’s enough.

“What are you…?”

“It’s a long story,” he says, “and I don’t know how much I tell you.”

“ _To_ tell me, you mean?” she challenges, already suspecting that he means no such thing. There aren’t enough pieces to the puzzle just yet, but she’s seen enough during her time at the SSR and SHIELD that there is a shape forming at least. 

He gives a small shrug. “May I come in?”

She steps aside, sweeping her hand to gesture him in. He does, carefully stepping over the broken vase. 

“Do you have a…”

“Oh, of course,” she says, giving herself a small shake and retreating to the kitchen to fetch a broom. Steve is still standing in her hallway when she returns, taking the broom and sweeping up the mess; she watches him with her hand to her mouth, uncertain what to say; once the floor is cleaned, he looks at her.

“Is it too late for that dance?”

“I’m married,” she blurts out. 

“I didn’t mean-- I know. That you’re married. And that he’s a good man. You have two children--”

She blanches. 

“How do you know that?” she challenges; she hasn’t even told Daniel yet, the doctor at SHIELD had only confirmed it a few days before.

“Should I start at the beginning?”

“That might be wise,” she says, leading them into a small living room and taking a seat. Steve follows suit, staring at his hands for a moment before speaking.

“I was… alive, after my plane went down.”

She can’t stop the gasp that escapes, wonders whether she could have done more, and he looks pained.

“Even if you’d found me, Peggy, you didn’t have the technology to unfreeze me. It’s… complicated. But I was found, eventually, and… the wars of the future are very different from the one we shared. But bullies are the same, no matter what. So I fought them, with a team, and we mostly won. And then…” he scrubbed a hand over his face. “The final win came at too high a price, and it was time for me to step down.”

“I’m sorry,” she says; she’s not certain of much, in this moment, but she’s sorry about this.

He shrugs again, the weight of a soldier still heavy on his shoulders. 

“When I had a chance to come back…. I thought about going to the Stork Club that night. But I knew that you had this life, that you were happy and loved. I didn’t want to…” he gives a frustrated sigh, standing up. “I shouldn’t have come at all.”

“Steve…”

“No, I’m sorry, I should have--”

“Dance with me?” she asks. 

He freezes, and she sets some music on the record player; when the first strains of a familiar tune fill the air, he takes her hand. 

“You don’t have to explain,” she says as they move. “I’ve missed you.”

It’s all that needs to be said. They dance for what feels like hours, the setting sun eventually filling the room with a warm glow; it is magical and healing and so utterly wonderful.. And when she kisses him, it is a goodbye, but also a beginning.

“Stay for dinner?” she asks. “Daniel should be home soon, and it’s my birthday.”

“I’d like that,” he says.

When Daniel arrives twenty minutes later, his eyes widen slightly, but he does not comment.

“Daniel Sousa,” he says, holding out a hand to shake. “And you are…?”

“Grant,” Steve says. “Grant Rogers.”

“Like Captain America?” asks Michael, who is regarding this stranger with careful eyes from behind his father.

“Something like that, young man,” says Steve, smiling as he bends down to shake her son’s hand; Michael is cautious, but takes it.

It is nearly midnight when Steve leaves, promising to stop by again when he had a chance. As Peggy watches him disappear into the dark, she hears the soft click of Daniel’s crutches on the floor behind her, and she sags backwards against her husband’s chest. A kiss is pressed against her hair, and she waits for the inevitable questions.

“What happened with the vase?” he asks, and she laughs as she turns to loop her arms around his neck; of course he knows just what to say.

“It’s a long story,” she says, running a finger along the open collar of his shirt. “And I have much more interesting news.”

Steve does visit, from time to time. There are things Peggy knows he wants to tell her but can’t, and things he is doing that he can’t explain but she suspects has to do with Bucky, somehow. The kids call him Uncle Grant; Peggy suspects they know the truth by the time they’re twelve, but they keep the secret. She stands for him at his wedding to a lovely woman, who knows just enough about who he once was and everything about who he is now. When Daniel passes away, he is the shoulder she cries on. And when a young Steve visits her in the hospital as she lays dying, some part of her recognises the pain in his eyes. She wants to tell him that it will work out; there will be loss, but there will be so much happiness too. She can’t, so she tells him about her life instead. 

He’ll have time for the rest. 


End file.
